"So, I need to finish all the floors in this dungeon?"
"Yes."
I sat in place dazed for a while and was brought to my senses when a rather youthful voice of a teenager spoke in my head.
"Someone has also left you a message. They said they were somewhat disappointed but also amused."
Crawling into aqua ditch right now sounded nice thinking about the past few days.
If I'd just walked into the fog instead of being wary.
Sigh, even thinking about it was making me embarrassed.
I could die from embarrassment and self-hatred.
But more than that, I was seething with rage.
They were disappointed?
All this time, I've been so gracious, and never blamed them. But they were disappointed?
Wasn't it their fault for not telling me that I needed to kill a boss monster?
Is saying "Kill the boss monster" such a difficult task? Four words! Just four words!
I ran to the second floor that was a blue colored forest and began letting my anger out on some innocent monsters. Aside from being fused from forest animals instead of insects there was nothing especial about the chimeras. They were bigger and stronger, not that it mattered.
Hard to catch? Just use more vines.
Too large? Just use more vines.
Too tough? I have thorns.
I didn't even know why I was being forced to finish a dungeon. Was there a reward? Except from the time inside the cave I've got nothing.
What the monster dropped was only a black and red stone and no mana.
Let's say this stone is some magical and overpowered item, but so what?
What happens if I complete the tower? Is it safe to assume that there's a human civilization waiting for me outside?
I suddenly found myself alone in the forest. Every monster around me lay dead.
"There's no one here." A passing sound broke apart the ensuing silence.
Morning light streaked through the strangely blue leaves of the trees and even the monster corpses on the floor bled in blue.
But any color other than red was welcome and the light was especially welcome.
"Actually I'm here too" A voice spoke.
"What?"
"...you're not here alone."
I looked at the distance where the blue sky could be seen. The headache was gone but it was distraughful to think how I'll find the boss room.
"You're right. I'm not alone."
At the end of the day, I shouldn't be angry at the white figure. The white figure isn't required to tell me anything.
I was just feeling a little entitled, that's all.
I took root inside the forest and sat down for a while to consider the future. For the time being there was nothing I could do except follow the white figure's orders.
My mana was stable. The door to the second floor allowed me to return to the first-floor boss room, and from there pass through the mist back to the mana-filled cave. I also didn't need to spent much mana on this floor and could always replenish it by killing monsters.
"Hey, system. How do you use the boss monster's reward?"
"Analyzing... did you try to absorb it?"
"I didn't."
"Good thing, it's better to form your own consciousness before absorbing another's."
"Explain more, I don't understand. What is this consciousness?"
"You didn't know? I thought you knew by how good you were at controlling the consciousness you got from those monsters."
The voice paused a bit before continuing, "It's like this, everyone is born with a fixed amount of consciousness. It doesn't increases or decreases unless something interferes. For most, it remains inert. But for some people, it develops into a unique ability, and they begin producing their own consciousness."
"And the stone?"
"It contains consciousness power. More importantly, it can generate more of it."
"What happens if I absorb it?"
"You lose the possibility of forming a power of your own. No external consciousness will ever suit you better than what originates from yourself."
Then the he added, "But you can absorb it after forming your consciousness."
"But if mana is consciousness, and abilities are unique to everyone," I asked, "then aren't the abilities I already have also a unique consciousness ability?"
"No, those are different things." The voice paused for a while before adding, "The world is very vast and wide, there are many things yet to be known."
He spoke again in a soft tone, "How about we continue exploring? We might find the way to the boss floor."
The exploration continued. Following the light tug of insight the mushrooms in the forest gradually increased.
Along the way the system taught me how to sense mana, no the consciousness better.
I stopped in front of a mushroom larger than any trees I've seen. In the second it was set ablaze. Then the blackening fungus burst and all the goo inside splattered everywhere.
In the place where it grew was a dark hole and insight lit up.
I jumped into the whole and began using my vines to climb down as a small ball of light lit my descent.
For a while, there was nothing beneath me, only darkness and wind. The shaft widened as I descended, my vines scraping against the mushrooms that grew densely on the wall.
The ground came into view, wind magic activated and I levitated without touching the ground as the cave stood before me.
Then instead of the youthful voice the previous system spoke, "Second floor boss dungeon. Fungus groove"
The floor was a one mass of fungal growth and the air in the cave had scattered blue spores flying around. At the cave center stood a single figure, motionless, framed by a massive fungal growth fused into the stone floor.
Goo began oozing from the walls, dripping from the ceiling, pooling around the figure's base in slow, viscous waves. Blue gas rolled outward in a thick cloud, heavier than air. Where it touched the ground, the fungal mat shuddered and swelled, veins lighting up in response.
I lit up a fire ball and sent it flying at the big lump. The fire blazed a bit before the goo ate it up and a goo shot at me.
More and more goo flew towards me as I dodged.
A black and red sphere appeared before me, it quickly ate away my consciousness as it grew and the sphere flew towards the big lump.
The moment it hit, the fungus crumbled away quickly. The mass disappeared before my eyes, but I could tell it wasn't dead from insight and the lack of system announcement.
I looked below carefully.
Suddenly the ground cracked.
A wet sound echoed through the chamber as the fungal floor split open. From beneath, veins of blue light surged upward, converging at the center.
I shot at the converging mass, but I needed to think about this thing a bit more.
I might need to burn everything here or the answer could be something else. But I had a feeling it was something else.
The feeling the boss gave me was that attacking it the way I do wouldn't work. It was like me and can always come back due to vegetative regeneration and my weakness is mental attack.
The moment the decision came, I could tell where it was and my consciousness pressed itself into it to squeeze it. The feeling of a small and weak little creature struggling in my grasp was felt before it was crushed.
The mushrooms in the room stopped moving.
I descended to the floor.
"Congrats you've completed the second floor."
At that moment a door appeared in front of me just like in the previous floor.
But for the time being I needed to look for the stone the boss dropped. I tried not to use insight and instead began feeling for the consciousness.
Sigh, I sighed a lot these days. Being reincarnated is written to be fun in isekai, but the excitement I felt from the first few days had already disappeared.
Isolation is said to be a form of torture. It was definitely boring me to death.